


be careful of slip-ups, and always have a sandwich on you

by bloodyangel6666



Series: be careful of the White Demon's tricks or you may fall for them(or him) [2]
Category: Gintama
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Attempt at Humor, Bad Flirting, Bickering, Fights, Fluff, Frenemies, Gen, Hot Springs & Onsen, M/M, Smoking, Swearing, they just express their love through fighting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-18
Updated: 2020-07-18
Packaged: 2021-03-04 19:01:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,630
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25261261
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bloodyangel6666/pseuds/bloodyangel6666
Summary: The pair of demons and their not so unsuspecting matchmaker-slash-sadist go on a much needed relaxing trip. Minus the relaxing part.This takes place almost a year prior to the events in the first one shot
Relationships: Hijikata Toshirou/Sakata Gintoki, Okita Sougo & Sakata Gintoki
Series: be careful of the White Demon's tricks or you may fall for them(or him) [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1830025
Comments: 2
Kudos: 30





	be careful of slip-ups, and always have a sandwich on you

On an almost freezing and windy mid-April morning, a group of students walked out of the dorms one by one, each of them yawning or grumbling about having to wake up this early in the morning.

Hijikata wasn't one of them though. He didn't have the energy to make a sound, let alone talk or whine about waking up at 5 am so that he could be ready at 6. Instead he walked over the smoking spot in the front yard with two paper cups of coffee in his hands and a backpack slung on his shoulder, expertly dodging the slow-walkers in front of him without spilling the coffee. When he reached his destination, he sat down on the bench, left one of the cups and the backpack next to him and fished around its pockets for the packets of Mayoboro. Five agonizing seconds later, he took one out, opened it impatiently and lit a cigarette to enjoy his coffee properly.

"Yo."

A familiar voice greeted. Hijikata tilted his head upwards mid-sip to regard the permhead standing in front of him.

"I made you coffee." Hijikata said instead of a greeting.

Gintoki's eyes lit up as he took a seat next to Hijikata(more like his backpack).

"You're a lifesaver, Oogushi-kun. Do you have a spare cigarette too?"

It was no secret that Gintoki smoked sometimes too, every time taking Hijikata's cigarettes instead of buying a pack for himself. But Hijikata was still too sleepy, so he didn't want to argue. He simply presented the open pack of Mayoboro to Gintoki and the latter gladly took out a cigarette. Without giving him time to even think of his next question about a lighter, Hijikata beat him to it by lighting his cigarette.

They fell silent as they sipped their coffee and smoked. It would be way more comfortable if the morning air didn't bite at their cheeks, noses and hands, but they tried their best in warming up by holding the hot coffee cups. It also wasn't a secret that they occasionally drank coffee together too, despite their never-ending bickering and fighting, but that was a whole other story.

Soon, the silence was broken by Sougo who seemingly materialized himself next to the bench, but truth was that the so-called demons were too drowsy to properly come to their senses and hear him coming.

"Good morning, Boss, Hijikata-san. What are you two doing, secluded from everyone else like that?"

Gintoki looked up slowly with a quiet 'hm?'. Hijikata frowned at Sougo.

"Why ask when you can see what we're doing?"

"Ah, well, from far away it looked like you're being lovey-dovey, so I decided to see for myself."

Hijikata's frown deepened. He looked at Gintoki who responded with another confused 'hm?'. His gaze trailed to Gintoki's outstretched arm, propped on the bench's backrest, right behind Hijikata's slouched back. Nothing to worry about, as far as Hijikata was concerned. So he turned his head back around to face Sougo and flipped him off, or more like raised his fist with the cigarette in between his fingers.

"Anyway, Boss." Sougo paused to sit next to Gintoki, then continued talking. "Why didn't you come by our apartment last night? We had beer and all."

"Wasn't in the mood." Gintoki replied, sticking a finger in his nose for a bit, then flicking whatever he found in there with his thumb nail. "And you also have a grumpy demon living there who doesn't like it when I drop by."

"That's because you eat most of our food when you come." Hijikata retorted.

"Aaah, don't talk like that so early in the morning… I'll cook next time I come, promise."

Hijikata rolled his eyes.

"Make sure you don't poison us."

"I'll pretend I didn't hear that from the guy who puts mayonnaise on everything. Seriously though, you're only wasting tasty foods like that. I still get nightmares for that poor chocolate you drowned with that goo." Gintoki made a grimace and nudged Sougo's side. "Soichiro-kun, make sure to not let Oogushi-kun eat any sweets and give them to me instead, okay?"

"Tch, pathetic. You dare insult mayo while you have an unhealthy obsession with sweets to the point of begging for it."

"Well, I surely didn't beg you to make my coffee extra sweet, so what's your defense for that, Oogushi-kun?"

An irritated growl escaped from Hijikata's throat.

"Shut up, moron."

Gintoki huffed in amusement and turned to Sougo again.

"So, did I miss anything last night?"

"Hm, just a cool song we recently discovered, Hijikata-san almost dying from an extra spicy mayonnaise and running to his room while crying, we also watched the love-action Gintama movie-"

"Oi, Sougo, I wasn't crying! My eyes watered from the chili you mixed with my mayonnaise!" Hijikata, already having enough energy, raised his voice in a roar.

Sougo put on an innocent face.

"Did I? I don't remember doing that, Hijikata-san. Are you sure you weren't hallucinating?"

"Aww, Oogushi-kun cried?" Gintoki joined with a mocking worried voice. "Come here, Gin-san will give you a hug-"

"Shut up! Both of you!" Hijikata seethed. "Damn sadists!"

Sougo sputtered, barely holding his laughter back while Gintoki didn't stop his chuckle as he wrapped a hand around Hijikata's shoulders despite his protests. His warm arm wasn't unwelcome, but his demeanor was, so Hijikata pushed him away and punched his shoulder. Gintoki replied with the same, and Sougo took his and Hijikata's cups from their unsuspecting hands to avoid spilled coffee. He also took a sip from Hijikata's coffee while the other two abused each other's shoulders, then proceeded with hair-pulling and wrestling which led to them falling on the ground, but they didn't seem to mind. That was, until Gintoki ended up laying on his back with Hijikata above him and what looked like another head above Hijikata's. Gintoki was the first to stop the childish fight by pressing a knee on Hijikata's chest and holding his left wrist while Hijikata, in turn, held his.

"Oi, did you grow a second head?"

Hijikata raised a brow.

"Did I beat you so hard that you lost your mind?"

"I could ask you the same, but seriously. Look."

Hijikata reluctantly looked over his shoulder. His gaze traveled up from a pair of shoes to a tall figure with a frowning face.

"Ah, it's just coach." Hijikata dismissed, but as the words settled in his mind, he gasped in surprise and got up hastily, dusting his clothes off. "Sorry about that, coach!"

Gintoki followed suit. He also made sure to cover his mouth behind his hand because of the smile that didn't want to go away.

"I was going to say that you don't use that same energy when running, but sadly, you use much more than that." The coach remarked. He sighed and looked around. "Is everyone here already?"

"We're missing three people." Sougo spoke up after looking around for the rest of their teammates.

"Ugh… Okita, call them and tell them to drag their asses here this instant." The coach then turned back to Hijikata and Gintoki. "Hijikata, Sakata, make sure you don't fight like that in the bus or I'll make you run after it. Am I clear?"

"Yes, coach." Said troublemakers replied in unison before turning to flip each other off when the coach wasn't looking.

—

"Guys, guys!" Yamazaki called out from one of the middle seats in the bus. "Does anyone remember that one song- we're going on a trip in our favorite rocket ship-?"

Not even ten minutes had passed from the beginning of their ride to a hot springs resort just outside of the city, and the others already started coming up with stupid shit. All of them started singing the song, except Gintoki who fell asleep in his place in front of Hijikata, and the latter who was just too grumpy and prideful to sing a song meant for children, not for twenty year-old men.

"Hey, quit it!" The coach's voice rose above the song, successfully making the singers shut up in the matter of milliseconds.

Hijikata breathed a sigh of relief and leaned back in his seat. He thanked the coach mentally and closed his eyes, relieved that it was quiet again so he could take a nap too. It was a risky move with Sougo next to him, but the latter had his eye mask on, so there wasn't much to be worried about.

It felt like minutes after he dozed off, but Hijikata woke up because of something that strangely resembled fingers going through his hair.

"You awake, Oogushi-kun?"

Finally, Hijikata opened his eyes and almost had a panic attack upon realizing that it was Gintoki who woke him up like that. He had twisted his body halfway towards Hijikata, a lazy smile plastered on his face.

"We have a five minutes break, so let's go for a quick cigarette."

With that said, Gintoki retreated his hand in favor of stretching it above his head. Then he stood up and got off the bus without waiting for Hijikata. The latter stared at his back for a few seconds while blinking his drowsiness and confusion away, then grabbed his cigarettes and lighter and hurried to join the others outside. They had stopped on a bridge above a river which was surrounded by beautifully blooming trees, but Hijikata barely registered the sight in his hurry to light a cigarette. He was also still very much perplexed by Gintoki's actions, but his barely functioning half-asleep brain could have imagined things. Yep, that was it. Just his imagination. But then again, why would he imagine Gintoki of all people lovingly running his fingers through Hijikata's hair? That was stupid. Outrageous. And now Gintoki was taking a drag of the cigarette while Hijikata was still holding it- Wait. Huh?

"Oi, what the hell are you doing?"

"Smoking?" Gintoki answered, way too innocently for Hijikata's liking. "I asked you for a cigarette, but you were zoning out, so I went ahead and treated myself."

Hijikata blinked a few times, took a few drags, then handed the cigarette to Gintoki.

"You can have it. I don't want it anymore."

Gintoki merely shrugged and slouched forward on the railing of the bridge. Hijikata pushed his unneeded thoughts of earlier away and followed the others' example in watching the fluttering petals from the trees. One of those petals fell on Gintoki's head, and Hijikata didn't fail to notice. He took it away without thinking much before doing it.

"What are _you_ doing, Oogushi-kun?"

Hijikata needed a few moments to realize that Gintoki's red eyes were now focused on him, as if trying to stare through his soul.

"There was a petal in your hair, idiot. Pay better attention to your surroundings." Hijikata scolded in a form of defense. He didn't know what was wrong with the atmosphere around them, but he felt somewhat exposed, so of course he had to defend himself.

The corner of Gintoki's lips curled up as his gaze trailed to Hijikata's hair, followed by his hand making a move to treat Hijikata the same way.

"Same goes to you and your annoying V-shaped bangs."

Just as fast as that moment of unnatural gentleness came, it was gone when the coach announced the end of their break. As he abruptly pulled back, Hijikata hoped no one saw this exchange. Gintoki didn't seem to care, as always, and he shoved his hands in his pocket on the way back to the bus.

They returned to their seats wordlessly. Hijikata tried sleeping again to forget his worries and suspicions, at least temporarily.

Four hours later, he was woken up by the same fingers in his hair and the same quiet question. This time, as much as he didn't want to admit that he liked it, Hijikata found himself wondering(and hoping) if Gintoki would keep this up on their way back.

—

Immediately upon arriving at the hot spring, everyone gathered their backpacks and scurried off to the entrance. Surprisingly, Gintoki didn't wait for Hijikata and instead followed Sougo. Hijikata actually felt a little uneasy, but still relieved that Gintoki was probably messing around out of boredom again. He snapped out of it because of Yamazaki saying something to him. Hijikata almost forgot they were still in front of the resort's entrance and the others have already gone in.

"Come on, Hijikata-san, the hot spring isn't going to wait for us!"

Hijikata nodded, pulled his shit together, and entered the resort quickly with Yamazaki trailing behind him. They joined their teammates at the reception to receive the keys to their rooms. Hijikata barely registered the coach saying that each person's roommate was assigned randomly. A hard slap on his back brought him back to reality this time, but now it was Gintoki.

"Which room did you get, Oogushi-kun? I got 15."

"Why are you telling me your room's number? I don't care about…" Hijikata trailed off as he looked down at his own key to see the number on it. 15. "...that. -What the hell?! Coach, can I switch with someone? I don't want to be stuck with-"

"I just said you're assigned randomly, Hijikata!" The coach roared from the other side of the room. "Didn't you listen? No switches!"

Hijikata clicked his tongue and walked around Gintoki to catch up with the others who went down the corridor to their rooms. Gintoki bit back a smile as he followed them too.

As the duo of demons walked in their room, Hijikata headed to the bathroom right away.

"I'll go first." Was all he said before tossing his backpack towards the futons. He closed the bathroom door after going in, barely holding back from slamming it because of the frustration from earlier taking the form of anger.

In the meantime Gintoki looked around for something to do while waiting. In the end, he settled with taking one of the sandwiches from Hijikata's backpack(because of course he forgot to prepare his own) and munch on it for a while. Though his food-stuffing paused when he realized Hijikata didn't get a towel before going in the bathroom, so… might as well assist him, right? And he did just that - unceremoniously opening the door while holding out a towel he just got from the wardrobe in the room. Hijikata had his back turned to Gintoki, so the latter could freely appreciate the view. The biceps, triceps, deltoid, trapezius- ooh, and a well-formed gluteus maximus too. 

Wait.

He actually remembered something from the Biology tutoring from Hijikata last year! That was neat. But not as neat as the live human model there whose muscles were defined almost to the point of looking like an exact copy of a drawing straight out of a Biology textbook. Err, with the exception that this one had actual skin on top of the muscles. And that this human was now looking over his shoulder, his eyes widening, then narrowing with murderous intent at Gintoki.

"What. The actual. Fuck are you doing, dumbass?! Are you a creep or something? Get out!"

"Don’t worry, Oogushi-kun. I can't see your body from that towel- which you forgot by the way. That's why I came to give it to you. And why are you so nervous anyway? There's nothing here I haven't seen already. We're both men after a-"

Hijikata's scowl grew even deeper. He stopped the water, turned around, stomped over to Gintoki and snatched the towel to wrap it around his hips.

"Even so, you don't have the right to barge in on someone in the bathroom, you bastard!" Hijikata's anger seemed to dissipate a bit after taking it out on Gintoki in the form of shouting(and silently hoping that the walls were thick enough and the others didn't hear them), but it refueled when he saw the sandwich in Gintoki's other hand which was hidden behind the door until now, so he grabbed the other's collar. "Is that _my_ fucking sandwich?!"

"Now, now, you're jumping to conclusions here. It could be anyone's sandwich." Gintoki defended, still calm despite the raging demon in front of him. "It could be mine too."

"How can it be yours when you don't have any bags or backpacks?!"

"Eeh? You noticed? Were you looking at me until now, Oogushi-kun~?"

"As if!" Hijikata simply shot back. He couldn't think of anything better to say, now that he was exposed like that. Not because of his almost naked body, but because of somehow being caught looking at Gintoki most of the time. That was... troublesome.

Gintoki rolled his eyes and stepped to the side so that Hijikata could go out of the bathroom. He handed him the half-eaten sandwich, took a step in the bathroom… and his bare foot gave away on the slippery floor. Honestly, he was expecting Hijikata to watch him fall and then laugh about it, but instead, less than a second later, he was stopped by a hand grasping his bicep, then an arm hooking around his waist. Hijikata still looked thoroughly pissed off.

Ah, was Gintoki going to get killed now?

"As I said earlier - pay better attention to your surroundings, moron."

...Probably not now. But someday for sure.

"Ah, sorry. I guess I fell for you on accident."

Fuck. Did he just say that out loud? Is there a time machine nearby? He's going to need that.

Gintoki straightened up, with the help of Hijikata of course, and simply stared at his savior, unblinking in his surprised/startled state. For a brief moment he noticed something in Hijikata's expression change, but everything returned to normal when the latter retreated his hands and turned away.

"Avoid slipping again. I won't be there to catch you a second time."

Gintoki finally regained the ability to blink when the door closed in front of him. The next moment, he couldn't contain his smile, so he covered it with his hand even though Hijikata couldn't see him through the door. But hell, now he was giddy, excited and embarrassed all at the same time because of Hijikata's unexpected(sweet) act. Well, it was more instinct and quick reactions, but Gintoki's churning insides didn't seem to agree.

Two minutes of fanboying and three and a half minutes of actual showering later, Gintoki realized that similar to Hijikata, he also forgot to take a towel. He cautiously opened the door, and was greeted by something soft landing on his head. A towel, he concluded as he grabbed it, and smiled at Hijikata who was now sitting down on one of the futons with his arms crossed.

"Thanks, Oogushi-kun."

—

The first ones to go in the hot spring were Gintoki, Hijikata and Sougo.

"Aah, this sure is nice. Right, Boss?"

Sougo had his eye mask on, even when he was soaked in the hot water, and his elbow was propped on Hijikata's head to 'accidentally' push him down. Gintoki, who was relaxing beside him, nodded and hummed in agreement. As for Hijikata, he thought it would be better to stay far away from Gintoki after the weird encounters from earlier, but being next to the other sadist was a bigger mistake.

"Oi, Sougo! Stop trying to drown me!" Hijikata almost shouted and smacked the back of Sougo's neck.

Said guy lifted his mask above one eye and faked a surprised 'oh'.

"Sorry, Hijikata-san. I mistook your head for a rock."

"Like hell you did! You did that on purpose!"

Sougo stuck his tongue out, then fixed his mask back in place. Hijikata groaned. New mission: get away from the bigger sadist of the sadist duo. And he did just that - by moving next to Gintoki. At a safe distance from him of course. But even though he did that, the white-haired idiot stretched his right arm and leaned it on the edge of the basin, right behind Hijikata's back which he touched slightly with the tips of his fingers. Hijikata wiggled out of the way immediately and glared at Gintoki.

"Seriously, I'll arrest you both once I join the police-"

"Ooh, kinky." Gintoki commented with a grin which Hijikata desperately wanted to wipe off with a fist. Or with something else. Wait. What something else? Huh...?

"Ah, I forgot something in my room. Be right back." Sougo announced before going out of the pool and disappearing out of sight in a few seconds.

Though Gintoki and Hijikata were too busy having an intense staring contest to hear him leave.

"Oogushi-kun, what's wrong? You look tense. Do you want Gin-san to give you a massage? He's really good with his hands~"

"Oi, stop spouting bullshit! You're creeping me out!"

Hijikata followed his words with moving farther away from Gintoki to prove his point, but the latter followed, and another wrestling session ensued. At one point they started laughing, obviously having fun with bruising each other. Sometime later, Gintoki's leg brushed Hijikata's. This kind of accidental touching was fine when there were layers of clothes between them, but skin to skin contact was a whole other story, far from the innocent fighting(not that there was anything innocent in fighting).

Gintoki's smile froze and he pulled back as if he was burned, and not from the hot water. Oh, speaking of the hot water, they were probably dizzy from it, so that could be the reason why they were both acting strange. Yep. That was all.

A few minutes of uncomfortable silence passed while they caught their breath, and then Hijikata spoke up.

"Idiot."

"Dumbass."

As Gintoki stuck a finger in his nose in the carefree way only he could muster, Hijikata sighed and pinched the bridge of his own nose.

Why did he have _those_ feelings for _this_ guy again?...


End file.
